Will they now dig up Alfred the Great?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/shortcuts/2013/feb/05/will-dig-up-alfred-the-great

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<strong>Age:</strong> 1,164.

<strong>Appearance:</strong> "More comely than … his brothers; in look, in speech, and in manners he was more graceful than they."

<strong>But still beardy with a crown on. </strong>Thou shouldst speak with more reverence of England's only monarch to be called "Great"!

<strong>Until the tabloids get started on Elizabeth. </strong>Thencefar, yes.

<strong>Is thencefar a word?</strong> I know not. But it doth not matter! We speak of Alfred, king of the West Saxons from the year of our Lord's Incarnation 871 until 899. With great wisdom did he reverse the Viking advances from the north and then agree a treaty, after which he established fortified settlements and the rule of law, and spread literacy and learning across the land, he himself being a writer, the noblest of all callings.

<strong>He also burned some cakes.</strong> All ovens doth vary in performance. Besides, probably figurative is that anecdote from Bishop Asser's Life of Alfred, shewing as it doth the king's low point before changeth he his tactics to a guerrilla campaign. Which lo! proved ultimately successful.

<strong>A great man indeed then. Richard III could have learned something about legacy from him.</strong> Funny thou dost mention that! For now it is the turn of the bones of Alfred to be upduggen, sayeth reports.

<strong>Excuse me?</strong> An attention-seeking vicar there is, known to the people of Hyde in Winchester as Cliff Bannister. Prepareth he a series of applications to the church authorities to exhume some unmarked bones at St Batholemew's, which includeth, it is said, King Alfred's.

<strong>Crikey! That would be exciting.</strong> Yea. Identifying the DNA scientifically challenging would be, but the recently discovered bones of Alfred's granddaughter Eadgyth may helpeth.

<strong>Is it really appropriate for this great king to have his bones dug up by a vicar?</strong> Ah, but an unmarked grave is yet more inappropriate, claimyth Bannister.

<strong>A likely story.</strong> Yea. And henceforth shall he be called "Cliff the Tendentious".

<strong>Do say:</strong> "If there is the slightest possibility that they may belong to so distinguished and historically important a figure as Alfred the Great … then we feel a moral obligation to remedy this gap in recognition."

<strong>Don't say:</strong> "Yeah, right."